Archive for the 'Web Sites' Category

Chocolate Biz

Published by Scott on February 14, 2007 in Chatter, Online Games and Web Sites. 0 Comments

Chocolate Biz is a simple strategy game with a candy theme that’s fitting for Valentine’s Day. The object is to unwrap the squares on the chocolate bar in as few moves as possible. choc-bizz.jpgWhen you click on a piece, the ones to the north, south, east, and west also come unwrapped. You can wrap them back up by clicking the same square again. Every click counts as a move.

It’s not too hard to figure out. I’d say it’s about a five minute diversion for adults, definitely longer for kids. When you solve it, a screen pops up saying the next level is loading. This doesn’t actually happen though. You’re just sent back to the start-up screen again. Oh well. Give it another try and see if you can do it in fewer moves.

NORAD Santa Tracker

Published by Scott on December 24, 2006 in Web Sites. 2 Comments

santa2.jpgThe NORAD Tracks Santa site is a nifty way to build excitement for Santa’s visit on Christmas Eve. Of course most kids are probably so keyed up that any more hype could prove to be dangerous. The Santa tracker is supposedly the work of the North American Aerospace Defense Command, a real life joint air defense effort of the United States and Canada. At the site you can see where Santa is at any given time as his journey is tracked by radar, satellite, various cameras positioned around the world, and fighter pilot escorts. In addition to the radar screen, there are updated movies to watch throughout the evening. Basically it’s an elaborate way to further deceive your gullible kids, but all in good fun.

BrainPOP Jr.

Published by Scott on December 4, 2006 in Chatter and Web Sites. 3 Comments

comingsoon.jpgAs cool as BrainPOP is, I think I like BrainPOP Jr. even better. That’s probably because it’s primarily aimed at the K-3 age group. I’m a second grader teacher and my home schooled boys are the same age as my students, so my experience with the site has been a more practical one as far as using it to reinforce some of the concepts I teach.

BrainPOP Jr. is actually very similar to BrainPOP. For each subject there is a short animated movie that provides an excellent overview of key ideas, although it’s a character named Annie that teams up with the robot Moby to host instead of Tim. There are also suggested activities, a comic, and a quiz. And just like at BrainPOP, the subjects are organized according to academic area, including science, health, writing, reading, social studies, and math.

There are plenty of differences though that make BrainPOP Jr. especially appealing to its target audience. First and foremost, there is a simple online game for each subject, which is absolutely irresistible to young children. No matter how simplistic or stupid they may be, and I’m talking beyond BrainPOP Jr. here, kids are absolutely mesmerized by these types of arcade games that are found on nearly every site aimed at kids. Fortunately the ones here at least reinforce the concepts being taught. There’s also a joke, discussion prompts, a “word wall” with key vocabulary terms, suggested books that can be found at the library, and simple online writing and drawing programs with subject related prompts. A really nice touch is that all of the text on the site is read aloud whenever the cursor points to it, so children with lesser reading skills aren’t hindered so long as they know how to manipulate a mouse.

Right now BrainPOP Jr. is free, free, FREE! They are still developing content so you can try it out until it’s full enough for them to justify charging a subscription price. You’ll actually notice “coming soon” banners over a lot of the topics but there’s still plenty of good stuff there for you and your young ones to investigate.

BrainPOP

Published by Scott on November 30, 2006 in Chatter and Web Sites. 2 Comments

timmoby.jpgBrainPOP is one of my favorite educational resources. The real draw of the site is the over five hundred animated movies in which Tim and his robot sidekick Moby explain everything from ions to how to read a newspaper. Each short does an excellent job in visually presenting a topic and explaining it in easy to understand terms.

Tim and Moby are plenty funny, mixing slapstick gags and jokes with their lessons. I especially love the nerd humor. In the measurement movie, for example, Tim begins explaining estimating lengths by saying, “Now most people don’t carry measuring tools with them wherever they go,” to which Moby beeps in protest. “Yeah, but that’s different,” continues Tim. “This is my lucky ruler.”

The site is organized by subject, including science, social studies, English, math, arts & music, health, and technology. In addition to the cartoon, there is also a comic, some activity ideas, and even a pop quiz for each topic. And while the site is primarily aimed at grades 3-12, I have used select material with my second graders and they had no difficulty understanding it.

Unfortunately BrainPop is subscription based. There are some free movies available in each subject but you get cut off after viewing a couple and prompted to subscribe. The good news is that you can sign up for a free 14 day trial and don’t even have to give any credit card information to do so.

Many school districts, including the one I work in, have subscriptions and will provide parents with password and login information so that students may access it from home. You can see if your local school is a subscriber by looking here. I should also mention that you can only log in this way during school hours, which end at roughly 5:00. So if you’re looking for homework help later in the evening, you’re out of luck unless you purchase a home subscription for $9.95/month or $99.00/year.

Although they’re a little stingy there at BrainPOP headquarters, it is quite an awesome site and highly recommended. Next time I’ll take a look at its spinoff for the primary grades, BrainPOP Jr.